An Uncommon Scoop on Fitbit

In the current edition of Fast Company, Christina Farr, gives a look at Fitbit and things that it may --- or may not --- be reliably able to tell you about yourself. Things that you could never imagine. For example, if you are pregnant, pretending to be sick, nervous in a meeting, trying to hide an office romance, or recovering from a hangover.

How? You say.

A lot of physiological changes happen to women when the are pregnant, including an elevated heart rate and temperature. On the notion of really being sick as opposed to be faking it: well your boss might like this one. When you are sick, your resting heart rate may actually go up and often require you to sleep. 

If you are nervous in a meeting it's no surprise that your heart rate is an indicator of anxiety and stress. And as far as an office crush is concerned --- it's not likely. Unless of course your heart does skip a beat when you see him or her.

Finally, the idea that your Fitbit could tell someone that you are suffering from a hangover --- well, it can. Fitbits can tell how much sleep that you've gotten and may actually be sensing an elevated heart rate due to the lack of sleep.

My other comment in all of this is one that is more important than these realizations. As I was reading this I thought, wow there's all this data that is being collected through the Fitbit system. Information that you might not want other people to have. I'm just saying this is something to think about considering that data breaches occur daily.